Scientist Uncover "God's Bathtub" In Australia

This was how Yahoo News reported it; Imagine a lake that's never been affected by climate change or any other man-made influences. Australian scientists say they have found just that —a remote lake whose crystal- clear waters seem to be in the same chemical state as they were

about 7,500 years ago. "It's like God's bathtub," Dr. Cameron Barr told the

Australian Associated Press of the body of water now named Blue Lake. "It is beautiful. It is

absolutely beautiful." Barr and his team of

researchers from the University of Adelaide say the

lake—one of the largest on North Stradbroke Island

off the south Queensland coast, according to the

AAP —is so pure that you can see more than 30 feet below the surface to its bottom. "It appears that Blue Lake has been an important

climate 'refuge' for the freshwater biota of the

region, and is in the same condition now as it was

7,500 years ago," Barr told the Australian

Broadcasting Corporation. Barr, who published his

findings in the current issue of Freshwater Biology, said it's the only such lake of its kind known to be

in Australia. To reach its conclusion, the team

studied the lake’s water quality, fossil pollen and

algae, which team members then compared with

photos taken of nearby areas on the island over the

past 117 years. Several other nearby former lakes have dried up

over the past 40 years due to climate change, Barr

noted. In fact, Barr's team was on North Stradbroke

to study the effects of those former bodies of water

when his team stumbled across the anomaly that is

Blue Lake. The lake’s water has remained unchanged, said Barr, because its waters drain into

a nearby swamp and are replaced by an aquifer every 35 days or so. "Because it's constantly being updated it doesn't suffer from the vagaries of the climate in so far as

it doesn't evaporate and become more saline," Barr

told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. "It

doesn't fill up and become fresher. It just remains

constant." Barr said something as small as

sunscreen samples from tourists could alter the lake’s chemistry.